The Woods All Black

This is a dark book... with a lyrical writing style. I loved that this is a trans character in a historical time when it was dangerous to even exists (although even as I write that I find it troubling that my brain is screaming "It's still dangerous!")

I'm a Lee Mandelo fan and this book didn't disappoint. It's a gutsy story...full of visceral energy, explorations of gender, acceptance and adversity. A great read.

Mandelo is a powerful writer, and although this book is totally different than his others, it's just as queer, just as thoughtful, just as beautifully written, and every bit as fantastic as his others, with so much nuance to the world and characters, there's no denying the reality of it, even at its most horrific.

Part historical fiction, part creature feature, part small-town religious cult (though there's not a cult here, per se), The Woods All Black starts off as a quiet, queer read that doesn't feel at all like horror (or, at least, not like non-real-life horror), but sucks in the reader through character and an incredibly nuanced job of world-building when it comes to 1929, Kentucky. (It's also worth noting here that Mandelo show more includes a list of resources he used as research in his acknowledgements within the book, and for anyone interested in queer history, they're worth looking into.) Yet, while I at first wondered whether this was going to be a horror novella after all, that quickly became clear, to the extent that I think any horror lover will be more than satisfied by what's within these pages.

I absolutely recommend this book, and you can count me in for anything Mandelo writes in the future. show less

Woods All Black is a beautifully written novella about Leslie Bruins, a WW2 nurse who has been assigned to a small, rural Appalachian town through the Frontier Nursing Services to take a post there.
Leslie prefers to see themselves as a man but in Spar Creek in 1929 that is very much not acceptable behavior. When Leslie arrives to the small town, he finds that the hellfire and brimstone minister of the town already has the town against them due to another young woman, Stephanie (Stevie) who also prefers to be known as a man and has brought down the wrath of his family and congregation.
Little do they know that Stevie has called upon the dark ancient magic living in the woods to bring his vengeance upon the town.
I really enjoyed this show more story and most likely because of the time period the story takes place in. It's a fascinating tale that explores reproductive rights and the terrors that small town fanatics can bring upon everyone. show less

This is a slow burn, for at least the half way point, with neither the fantastic or romantic elements appearing till the back half. When those elements move to the fore, they do not disappoint. It's sort of wild that the experiences if a nurse in 1920's Appalachia, battling religious authority, general patriarchy and eugenics resonate disturbingly a full century later. Same goes for the treatment of trans characters.

This is a violent tale. Even more so once those with power learn that just because they assign a meek role to members of their community does not mean that those members will follow the role assigned.

I love small typographic choices, like using 2 different script fonts for the text of letters from different correspondents. I show more love the close third person narration using "he" for the trans-masc protagonist who, for survival purposes presents as a woman for most of the book.

When a trans character becomes a shapeshifter, it's delightful that a side effect is the ability to adjust, among other things, their physical sexual characteristics.

This is a book I can recommend to many people interested in a period piece on nursing in spite of the queer spiciness and fantasy (and non fantasy) violence. This is a book I can definitely recommend to anyone excited by queer spiciness.

There was a point in my life when the town pastor being the antagonist might have ruffled my feathers, but this captures so well how a toxic patriarchy can corrupt everyone who benefits from it. show less

4/5th into the novella, I had to set it aside for a bit and then come back to it the next day. There was never a question of me finishing it but I had to step away for a bit so I can appreciate the ending. But let me backtrack a bit.

Set in 1929 in the Appalachian mountains in Kentucky, the novella introduces us to Leslie - a veteran nurse of WWI who now works for the Frontier Nursing Service. As part of that employment, Leslie needs to fit it so despite living openly as a man, he ends up toning down his appearance and even conforming to the gender he was born as in order to fit. Or at least he tries.

Spar Creek is a small village in the middle of nowhere - full of a hell and brimstone preacher, small-minded locals and a general belief show more that men are men and women are women and they have God-given places on Earth. Not that any of this is new to Leslie - it is not the first post where that happens. But as it turns out, not only the locals are not as united in trusting their preacher but there is also something dark in the woods around the village. And so it begins.

That pause I had to make so I can actually finish the novella which I started this review with? The author decided to include very graphic descriptions of a few sex acts. That usually does not bother me but here they grated - they did not really fit properly in the story and felt almost like making a point that these can be written and published. I think I can see what the author was going for and why they were included but then just made me wonder if there is enough left over to keep reading - as at this point the story was dissolving into a rage-induced nightmare in other ways as well, I really needed some space before finishing the tale. It was a good idea to break it up - while the novella remains dark and disturbing, it does get back to a less graphic imagery.

Historical novellas (and novels) can be tricky to pull off - especially when the attitudes of the contemporaries are so different from the current ones. Lee Mandelo manages to navigate that very nicely - the story feels like it takes place between the wars (although if you closed your eyes, you can see it happening almost a century later as well - which is part of the point of the story I think). What the novella is less successful in building the characters - they feel almost like an afterthought - even Leslie.

If you like dark queer tales and you do not mind darkness in all its shapes and forms and do not mind graphic details (both sex and gore-related), that may work for you. I am glad I read it and I will probably pick up other works from the author. The acknowledgement section provides a long list of non-fiction works about the Frontier service and the history of queerness in USA. show less

Great for when you need a rage-inducing and releasing cathartic read. Unfortunately you have to get through the fundamentalist rage inducing part first, but it certainly pulls no punches in the end and there's a beauty in the unapologetic fierceness of the characters, even if we only get a taste of them. I'm not sure I enjoyed it, per se, but it's certainly a powerfully vivid story.

Advanced Reader's Copy provided by Edelweiss.

Some interesting ideas in terms of the setting and speculative elements. Unfortunately, revenge fantasy doesn't really do it for me, and there's not a lot of other narrative interest to be found in this book. Character development is particularly neglected: Leslie (and indeed most other characters) are exactly the same at the beginning of the story as they are at the end. I find myself wishing that Stevie was the protagonist instead--his semblance of an arc and close connection to the setting are the most compelling part of the book, and both are muted by being filtered through Leslie's outsider perspective.